Link: Would BDSM Sex Robots Violate Asimov's First Law?

[slvsara]

An interesting article/discussion topic.....especially for those of us who find eroticism in fembot doms/tops.

https://gizmodo.com/would-a-bdsm-sex-ro ... 1829595067

[Lithorien]

I would say that depends on which camp you are in about BDSM in general. For many, self-inclusive, the element of consent overrides the small amount of harm - that is, it's believed that an individual can consent to the harm of themselves, and thus it is no harm at all. Then there's the other camp that thinks that consenting to harm is a sign of legal insanity, and thus the consent is rendered invalid - these people would argue that BDSM-bots would be violating Asimov's laws.

At least, that's how I see it.

[Saya]

Personally, I think that if you were to seriously consider implementing Asimov's laws in actual robotics programming, something's already gone wrong, but I digress.

First off, it would have to depend on what a robot defines as "harm" (which, not to keep going on about it, is actually something that comes up in Asimov's works. See "Runaround" and "Escape!" for specific examples). If by the very nature of causing pain, then a robot would be violating the First Law. If your definition of harm is something with the potential for harm, such as striking someone with an object, even if said object wouldn't do lasting permanent bodily harm, then it would also violate the First Law. If you define harm as permanent injury, or a deliberate attempt at causing great physical harm strictly for the purposes of causing harm, then no, BDSM wouldn't violate it. If practiced correctly, that is.

But of course the biggest issue would be "is the robot designed for BDSM?" In that case, then the First law would have to be tweaked or modified to permit such actions in the first place, otherwise what would be the point of even making the thing in the first place? It would probably need programming to ensure that it knew what things were like safe words, what sort of strength to apply to strikes and bindings and would probably include a number of hardware and software failsafes.

The engineering issue (and it helps to always view any kind of argument on the nature of the laws of robotics primarily as an engineering issue first and a philosophical issue second) is that a robot with Asimov's laws designed for BDSM would probably have to be specifically designed for it, or only be available though a hard switch of programming settings. BDSM functions would clash pretty hard with what could reasonably be expected of, say, a maid android or a generalized homecare model designed for home duties that potentially excluded cleaning. So it'd be pretty inconvenient on the whole to make a BDSM function in one of those robots, both for the engineer and the consumer. It'd make more sense to just make a specialized "Dominatrix/Master" model in my mind, but that would come with additional costs to the end user and would probably be a bit of an embarrassment for the owner in our ever judgmental 'polite' society.

Finally, while I can see how BDSM sex robots would be of a particular interest to this forum, I think a more important question would be "would a Medical robot violate the First Law", because once a defibrillator needs to be used, it's already done that handily by the strict definition of the law.

[Rotwang]

Asimov's laws work within a literary context, the second you try to hardcode them into a robot, you might prefer to rewrite the entire law codex of your country, it'll be easier ...